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Topic: Albums that should be reissued (Read 1608 times)

What are your most wanted reissues (that never came out on cd or sold out so quickly you missed it)?

Mine:

Abecedarians--80s band from l.a. area who did gloomy ambient rock, on the famous Factory label. Caroline put out a comp cd in late 80s that goes for outrageous prices. A double or even multiple disc set would be a dream come true.

Red Temple Spirits--another overlooked band, similar to above.

Shriekback--Jam Science. Never released on cd. A crime.

Swans--the early to mid 90s stuff on Young God.

Yagya--Rhythm of Snow. I'm still pissed this cd is unavailable, dammit!

As a close tangent to this..one album that has never been officially released (some bootlegs, I believe) is Tangerine Dream's soundtrack to The Keep. I saw a bootleg of this go for over $500 on ebay years ago. Damn shame it's never come out as it's a GREAT soundtrack.

Yep, "Jam Science" - never officially released, only in pieces on various compilations such as "Evolution" & "The Y Years" (which contains most of the Y Records version of the album, with quite different mixes of the songs that would eventually wind up on the 'official' Arista release; supposedly the Y Records material was never sanctioned by the band). Too bad as it remains one of the best Shriekback albums.

Re, Yagya: "R.O.S." is set to be reissued on CD this fall (already out on LP), as is the rest of his back cat. A number of friends & colleagues have been asking about this, as they're not willing (I don't blame them) to shell out a king's ransom for the originals.

Re, "The Keep": I have a CD edition of this I found in a Texas bookstore a few years back for $6 (!!), but doubt it's authenticity as a 'legit' issue - looking in to Discogs, here it is: http://www.discogs.com/Tangerine-Dream-The-Keep/release/545489. Always mystified by the (meritless) salivation this work always brought out - it's not particularly good IMO (sorry, Bill ), and certainly not one of TD's best soundtracks (surely not on par w/"Thief" or "Risky Business" or even "Miracle Mile").

Some of my own titles that I'm sure will never see light on lit'l silver discees:

Darren, I agree it's not on a par with Thief or Miracle Mile, but while Risky Business has some great tracks, it's not that good, IMO. Maybe why I like The Keep so much is that I loved the movie. It's funny because it's OBVIOUSLY been butchered by the studio (this was likely before a director like Michael Mann got final cut of a film in his deal), but even though it's tremendously flawed (seems to be missing huge chunks of the movie), I dig it. With a cast like Scott Glenn, Ian McKellan Jurgen Prochnow, Gabriel Byrne, and Robert Prosky, what's not to love? I particularly like the percussive main title theme, with that great long tracking shot down through the trees as the Nazis enter the Carpathian village. Too eerie. But yeah, I will give you that Thief and Miracle Mile are great pieces of work.

The author of the book the film was based on (F Paul Wilson) hated the movie A LOT (he and I discussed this years ago on on an old USENET discussion forum). He hated the changes made to his original story, e.g. changing Molasar from a "regular" vampire to whatever the hell he is in Mann's version - although I like Mann's version better). It sucks that something is holding up a DVD release. I'd love to see Mann get to do a director's cut and restore whatever Paramount axed out of the film. One thing Michael Mann can do is tell a coherent story and The Keep was NOT coherent.

UPDATE: Went to IMDB and found out Mann's original cut of the film ran 3 1/2 hours! Shit, no wonder the 90 minute film that WAS released is a mess. Also, here's the reason why no DVD of this:

"While it was released on VHS and laserdisc, it has never been release on DVD. It has been noted that Paramount was going to release it on DVD in 2004 but two reasons have stopped them from doing so. First, the studio wasn't able to obtain the rights of the soundtrack by Tangerine Dream. Second is that Michael Mann (who has disowned the film) forced the studio not to release it." (see the quote here http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085780/trivia)

I can imagine if Mann's original film was 3.5 hours and he had to CUT IT IN HALF, yeah, I guess he's pretty pissed about it. But why not let him restore the original version, assuming the footage exists?